Manassas to Tyson via vienna help! (Reston, Centreville: home, neighborhoods, schools)

[WenchW]

first, new poster, please excuse if i go around the actual question!

for 3 days next week i have a class in vienna..plan to carpool with my mom who works @ freddie mac in tysons about 4 miles away

her current route..leaves at 645, @ toll road @ 730, (she said it took about a half hour for her to get down from where she gets off to vienna address and back to work)
i believe she takes 28 all the way to the dulles toll road then up to tysons...which i dont get.......she goes all the way out, just to come back (via mapquest its only 20 miles from here to vienna)

i am pretty familiar with the roads around ffx..
we live in mid pwc, a few miles from clifton... generally going via clifton road/henderson area to ffx is the best way than going all the way into manassas/rt 28

so ..i just need suggestions on this route

i recommended to her we just go via clifton to ox/123 and all the way up
how about jermantown?
how about 66 @ this time?

my class is 9-3...coming home isnt a worry really.....its just getting there in time in the shortest route possible.
any suggestions?

[ngadude]

I used to live in Manassas and commuted to Reston (lived there until October 2008). Definitely do NOT go to Rt. 28 - that makes no sense from Clifton (??).

I think some way more directly from Clifton (Rt. 645, etc.) sounds better, but I don't know.

66 - I used to hit it more like 6:15 AM, and it was not bad to Fairfax County Parkway. I can't speak to what it is like past there though, but it always looked to get worse as you got close to Rt. 50.

I personally most of the time avoided 66 like the plague, and still do, as I now live in Gainesville and commute to Reston.

I think clifton to Rt. 123 all the way up maybe sounds good, but I have no idea what that is like at commuter hours.

All I can say is - don't go Rt. 28 between Manassas & Centreville, very very bad! And, i think above Centerville, it is no picnic either, but not sure.

Hope that helps, I think you have the right idea of maybe Rt. 645 to Jermantown Rd. to Rt. 123. But, i have no experience with that, just that Rt. 28 especially below Centreville, REALLY BAD!

[Claire2900]

New Braddock to a left on Shirley Gate. Cross over Lee Highway and Route 50 (you are on Jermantown Rd). Jermantown Rd and then cut thru the Vienna metro and make a right onto Kingsley off Nutley. You need to look at a map, but roughly Kingsley to Cottage and then Old Gallows Rd.

[WenchW]

i was thinking shirleygate to jermantown, am familiar with that route......but with the time, was worried about the schools bus/school time on jermantown???
anyone have any info on the traffic on this route at 8am ish?

im a bit confused as to the kingsley to nutley route?.......why would i go to nutley?

[Claire2900]

you need to cross over Nutley to cut thru the neighborhoods in Vienna. You can't get from Jermantown Rd to Kingsley without crossing Nutley. Look at a map

[bmwguydc]

The schools are a consideration on Jermantown, since you have two pubic schools in the city and then Flint Hill. And then you have the school in Oakton once you turn on to Route 123 from Jermantown. But, I don't think that you'd have more than a speed-limit-reduction induced delay on Jermantown. If you're leaving at 6:45, it should not be too much of an issue.

66 would be fine, because you're HOV compliant, but the problem is there is no HOV exit at Nutley Street, so you'd have to make your way across the traffic between 123 and Nutley if you were to get on at Stringfellow (HOV morning-only entrance) from the Centreville side of Clifton Road.

Where in Vienna do you need to go? Is it downtown, as in Maple Avenue, or Dunn Loring/Gallows, or Tysons? It would make a difference regarding the suggested route to avoid traffic. 123 can be fine, but it will be slower than normal traffic through Fairfax and Oakton.